Comments on Gali’s “Hysteresis and

the European Unemployment Problem Revised”

Robert J. GordonNorthwestern University, NBER, CEPR

ECB Forum on Central Banking,Sintra, Portugal, May 22, 2015

Starting Point: Euro Unemployment Rate Behaves Differently Than US

• US: Substantial cyclicality with consistent reversion toward a roughly constant mean.

• Euro area unemployment:– Wanders around an upward trend– Movements less volatile than US– Movements more persistent than US– No tendency to gravitate toward a long-run

equilibrium value

The European UnemploymentPuzzle

• US stationary stochastic process contrasted with• Euro stationary stochastic process with a UNIT

ROOT.• Aim of paper: explore causes and implications• Need to discover disturbance that contributes the

permanent effect. Candidates:– Natural rate hypothesis– Long-run tradeoff hypothesis– Hysteresis hypothesis

My Discussion RaisesMore Questions than Answers

• Questions about the Unit Root characterization– Euro Unemployment similarities to US

• Similarities US vs. Euro inflation process• Reasons to study inflation behavior in preference

to wage change behavior• Econometric model for US inflation• How close can we come to using that model on

Euro-area inflation?• Brief comments on the paper’s three models

Indeed Euro and US UnemploymentSeries are Very Different, 1970-2014

Omit 1970-89

Regressions Euro U on US U, Lags 4 and 12, Constant Fixed at 3.55

Freely Estimated Constant

Augment Table 1 for 1980-2014,Unit Root Rejected for Europe

Reasons to Study Inflation Insteadof Changes in Wages

• Central banks have an inflation target, not a wage target

• Time series on compensation per hour are noisy• Productivity growth (θ) mediates effect of wage

changes on inflation, change in ULC = πw - θ • Inflation equals change in unit labor cost only if

labor’s share is constant: πp = change in ULC• Reality: Euro’s labor share exhibits persistent

movement up and then down

US vs. Euro Inflation Rate,Can You Tell the Difference?

US vs. Euro Wage Change,Major Differences, 1975-2014

Some of the Difference Explainedby Productivity Trends

US vs. Euro Change in Trend Unit Labor Cost

Euro Inflation vs. Wage Change,1975-2014

Euro Inflation vs. TULC Change,1975-2014

Euro Level of Labor’s Share

Explaining US Inflation:The Triangle Model

Macro is Like Micro:Supply Matters, Not Just Demand

Variables and Coefficients,Fit to 1962:Q1 to 2006:Q4

Dynamic Simulation,2007:Q1 to 2015:Q1

Parallel Inflation Equations,Euro vs. US

Euro Actual Unemployment, NAIRU, and Unemployment Gap

The Only Way to Test an Inflation Equation: Dynamic Simulation

Add the Hysteresis Effect,4-Quarter Change in Unemployment

Dynamic Simulation Nails theActual Values in 2014

Comments on Natural Rate Model

• Natural Rate model generates increased unemployment through an exogenous shock to wage markup

• Operates like an oil shock, raising inflation and unemployment, reducing output

• Is wage markup shock a plausible event in data covering the entire Euro area when wage bargaining is still done at the national level?

• No reference to French general strike of 1968, big increase in Euro-area labor’s share 1970-80

Long-Run Tradeoff Model

• Now the shock is to price target of central bank• Price adjusts immediately, output and

unemployment react slowly• This is the opposite timing sequence of the real

world, where the instrument of the central bank is the interest rate, not the price level.

• A long, slow slog to change inflation rate. Think of 1980-81. Interest rates rise, AD slows down, unemployment rises, and only then does inflation respond

Disinflation 1981-86: High Interest Rates Followed by Decline of Inflation

Hysteresis Model

• Standard definition: dependence of wage and price change on CHANGE in unemployment rate, not the LEVEL of the unemployment rate

• The model makes wage change depend on the change in employment, not unemployment

• But wage change was roughly constant 1992-2014, whereas employment growth was 0.4 1989-1998, 1.1 1999-2008, then -0.6 2009-2014.

• No significance test of level effect vs. change effect• No dynamic simulations of performance 2011-14

Conclusion: Puzzles About EuroInflation-Unemployment Process

• Puzzle #1, why was U rate so low pre-1975?– Excess demand together with rapid catch-up productivity

growth– Rapid labor supply growth from farm to city migration

• Puzzle #2, why U rate rose so much 1975-85?– Potent trio of oil shock, labor share wage markup shock,

wage indexation regime of disinflation. • Puzzle #3, why U rate so high compared to US?– Rephrase question. Why is March 2015 U rate 4.8 percent

in Germany and 11.3 in Euro area?– Answer? Every type of structural maladjustment